FINAL STATS

Lynchburg, VA – The Wagner College women's lacrosse team overcame an early 3-1 deficit to lead 4-3, fell behind 11-6 eight minutes into the second half, before closing the game with a 4-0 run before running out of time as Liberty held on for the 12-11 win.

With the loss, the Seahawks fall to 4-2 in seeing their two-game winning streak come to a halt while the Flames won their third straight to improve to 4-2.

Sophomore Jessica Mills (Vernon, NJ/ Vernon Township) was at her play-making best, scoring two goals while dishing out five assists in notching a team-high seven points. Senior Annie O'Connor (Syracuse,NY/ Westhill) continued her scoring surge with five points on three goals and two assists, while freshmen sensation Casey McCarthy (Cypress, TX/ Cy-Fair) added two goals.

After Liberty galloped out to that 3-1 lead 8:33 into the game, the Seahawks went on a three-goal splurge to jump ahead 4-3 on goals by junior Michela Galante (Maplewood, NJ/ Columbia), O'Connor and freshman Shea Gegan (Manasquan, NJ/ Manasquan). The latter two goals in this 3-0 Seahawk run were assisted by Mills with the Gegan goal at 16:00 giving Wagner its lone lead of the game.

The Flames outscored the Seahawks 8-2 on a run that bridged the two halves. Liberty outscored Wagner 5-2 over the final 14:36 of the first in half to seize an 8-6 lead at intermission and then came out blazing in the second half, knocking in three unanswered goals, the third of which came from Jen Freymond at the 22:18, that extended the Liberty lead to 11-6.

Nearly four minutes later, Mills found the back of the cage at 16:34 to stem the tide after receiving a feed from former high school teammate Stephanie Peterson (Vernon, NJ/ Vernon Township) which made it an 11-7 game. After Kacie Fogle pushed the Liberty lead back to five at 12-7 with 14:44 left, Mills struck for her second goal of the game off an O'Connor assist at the 10:58 mark, which made it 12-8 and kick-started a game-ending 4-0 run that would come up just short.

McCarthy slammed home a pair of goals 1:03 apart, an unassisted tally at 8:16 that made it 12-9, followed by another at 7:13 off a Mills assist, to make it a 12-10 game. The defenses took over from there as neither team could connect until freshman Gretchen Fay (Spring Lake Heights, NJ/ Manasquan) sailed in a goal off an O'Connor assist with 21 seconds to play which made it 12-11. The Flames won the ensuing draw control, however, and were able to run out the clock in holding on for the 12-11 win.

Nina Dunay led Liberty on the offensive end with four goals and two assists while Kallie Britton, Morgan Becker, Fogle and Sam Struss finished with two goals apiece.

Liberty out-shot Wagner 27-23 and led in draw controls 18-7 while the Seahawks held a sleight 22-19 edge in the groundball department. Wagner was 1-of-2 on free-position shots while limiting the Flames to 0-of-4 shooting on their free-position shots.

Seahawk freshman Katie Ferraro (Owings Mill, MD/ McDonogh) had eight saves in goal while Liberty's Kristen Masullo recorded seven saves.

The Seahawks are next in action on Wednesday, March 13 when the Seahawks travel to Easton, PA to meet the Leopards of Lafayette with first draw set for 7:00 pm.